Brothers and Sisters of the Left, we do ourselves no favours if we allow our politicians to do things we would never tolerate in the Opposition.
The Nash Slash Cash needs the lash!
The Nashy is the Forestry Minister.
He has previously refused point blank to investigate slash.
He has raised donations from the Industry he is the Minister of…
Stuart Nash also carries out much of his election fundraising in this sector. In the last three elections he declared large donations totalling $99,000, $27,500, and $49,504. In 2020 about half of it came from forestry and timber companies. One timber businessman explained his financial backing for Nash, saying “It is important to the economy that government has politicians who understand industry.”
Being a Minister of Forestry who has been bankrolled by the sector he regulates does not mean he has broken any rules or done anything wrong. But it does raise questions about conflicts of interest, and about whether Nash’s funding has fostered a highly-favourable orientation towards the sector his donors come from. The public might well suspect that he has become too close to this vested interest.
…if National or ACT had a Minister of an under regulated Industry taking huge donations from them while arguing there is no need to regulate we would be screaming bloody murder but because it’s the Nashy and we love Labour and tribal tribal tribal there is not a fucking word?
Look, the foreign owned Forestry Industry have been able to get any with murder (I mean that figuratively and literally, that Industry kills so many people each year thanks to poor wages and cheap safety), this Forrest Industry is absentee Capitalism at its worst and they need urgent crack down and regulation.
Nashy needs to get the fuck out of the way and stand down from Forestry. We wouldn’t tolerate this from National or ACT, we shouldn’t tolerate it inside Labour!
Whether he likes it or not, it’s the perception that he’s a stooge for that Industry, and that perception can not dilute any inquiry.
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Why isn’t the Forest Service still operating these plantations and native forest harvests anyway?
They could start cancelling the Crown Licences and go back to how it was before.
Growing radiata pine on hills is a complete waste of time. The terrain is difficult to access and work on, so after planting many of the trees do not get thined or pruned leaving them to be full of knots and inferior for use as structural timber. Harvesting on hills is tricky and dangerous, resulting in many forestry worker deaths. It’s hard on equipment , logging trucks, operators and drivers.
When the timber is milled it often bows straight away as the tension in the trees is released when the saws cut through stressed fibres. This stress is due to the tree having to grow straight and upright on a steep gradient.
Also radiata pine is shallow rooted, so it does very little to stop erosion and slips. Then there is the slash.
Why? Because private enterprise does it better and the Forest “Service” thought they were a service soaking up maori unemployment providing well paid jobs and keeping men out of jail and at the same time developing a ‘national interest’ economy. Prior to Douglas we had at times ‘Labour interest’ economy, Muldoon’s ‘National interest’ economy, naive Douglas and co have given away an ‘international interest’ economy.
I saw the interview with the woman from TV3 asking him why he doesn’t enact some of the stuff from the review, we are we are was his response but the critical question asked was never replied to by him.
Growing radiata pine on hills is a complete waste of time. The terrain is difficult to access and work on, so after planting many of the trees do not get thined or pruned leaving them to be full of knots and inferior for use as structural timber. Harvesting on hills is tricky and dangerous, resulting in many forestry worker deaths. It’s hard on equipment , logging trucks, operators and drivers.
When the timber is milled it often bows straight away as the tension in the trees is released when the saws cut through stressed fibres. This stress is due to the tree having to grow straight and upright on a steep gradient.
Also radiata pine is shallow rooted, so it does very little to stop erosion and slips. Then there is the slash.
I always suspected he was compromised by the industry. The Gisborne District Council commissioned a report in 2018 I think after a similar flooding event that details the problem and the recommended solutions, yet Nash has done nothing and just does a rabbit in the headlights impression when asked about it by reporters.
People here are angry, right now they’re busy cleaning up but when they get some spare time Nash is in for a hard time.
Hmm, I seem to recall that the 2018 ‘Aotearoa Environmental Standard for Plantation Forest’ said:
“Slash should be placed on stable ground so that it rots.”
Stuart Nash is a guy who’s been involved in forestry for his entire life, so it’s not surprising that he has received donations from those involved in forestry.
I wonder when these questions will be asked of the anti-forestry goons currently pretending that sheep farming would have been a more environmental use of these afforested lands?
Just a comment about slash itself.
Years ago when I was working with a mobile sawmill, felling the odd tree in shelter belts then sawing it into planks, a visiting Japanese forester stopped for a chat.
He asked what was going to happen to all the discarded timber( usually a third to a quarter of the whole tree).
I said in this case the landowner would use it all as firewood.
He told me how he was puzzled by the amount of ‘slash’ he saw left in commercial forests here. Evidently in Japan EVERYTHING gets used. A chipper reduces all debris and it gets used for particle board, paper-making and the like. There is no slash left behind to provide fuel for forest fires or become flood debris.
Later visiting Asian countries I saw forests where this is true. There is no ‘slash’ because nothing is wasted.
I keep wondering why we cannot do the same thing here? We might even make some extra coin out of it.
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